1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an information processing apparatus which controls the execution of jobs performed by a printing apparatus and by a post-processing apparatus that performs a post-processing step in which is used printed matter printed by the printing apparatus, and relates to a control method for controlling this information processing apparatus.
2. Description of the Related Art
There is what is known as a photobook order service, with which a user can order a book in which the user has laid out a number of pages on a personal computer and arranged image data as desired. This photobook is made up of a number of parts, such as the body, front cover, and book jacket, and since the post-processing performed after printing varies for each of these parts in the course of producing the photobook, the processing was done on separate post-processing apparatuses. Thus, the printing has to be done in part units, and that printed matter has to be fed directly to the post-processing apparatus and subjected to post-processing, so that sorting won't take as long in transporting the various parts of printed matter to the post-processing apparatus. Whether the front of the paper fed to the post-processing apparatus in this case is determined ahead of time by what kind of material is being produced, what kind of paper feed the post-processing apparatus is capable of, and so forth. Thus, it is necessary to control the side of the paper discharged at the printing stage so that the worker can collect the various parts of printed matter together and feed them efficiently into the post-processing apparatus.
Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2009-269310 is an example of a technique for controlling the side of the paper discharged in a printing job on the basis of the side of the paper fed to the post-processing apparatus. In Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2009-269310, whether the front of the paper discharged from the printing apparatus is decided on the basis of capability information indicating the paper feed method of the post-processing apparatus, the paper discharge information thus decided is sent to the post-processing apparatus, and paper discharge information is outputted as work instructions. Also, controlling so that these work instructions are discharged on the very top of the stacked printed matter makes it easier for the worker to obtain the work instructions.
With she prior art referred to above, however, if the post-processing is different for a plurality of parts in the production of a photobook, then even though the side of the paper feed to the post-processing apparatus is different from one part to the next, control of paper discharge cannot be switched far every part. Also, with prior art, the only thing controlled was whether the paper in a print job would be discharged face-down (with the front of the printed matter facing down) or face-up (with the front of the printed matter facing up).
However, when a single job consists of a plurality of pages, there is the possibility that when the pages are outputted from the post-processing apparatus, they will be in reverse order, so that the order goes from the last page to the first page. Also, a particular user generally does not order a large quantity of photobooks with the same content, and instead it is more common for different users to order small quantities of different books. Therefore, when photobooks are put together, the various printed parts are preferably arranged in the order of the various corresponding books, so that the first printed matter for each part is a part of book A, and the second printed matter is a part of book B. With the prior art discussed above, however, since the order is not controlled between the parts of the various books, a problem is that the parts corresponding to each book have to be looked for.